The present invention relates to catheter placement units and, more particularly, to catheter placement units of the reel type disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,561,445 granted Feb. 9, 1971 to D. Katerndahl, et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 3,995,628 granted Dec. 7, 1976 to J. Gula, et al.
Both the Katerndahl, et al. and Gula, et al. units are bidirectional. That is, the catheters wound therein can be both advanced from and retracted into the container of the unit. On occasion, while the needle is inserted into the vein of a patient, the nurse or doctor inserting the catheter might inadvertently rotate the reel in a manner that retracts the catheter into the container and severs it on the heel of the needle of the unit. When the catheter is again advanced from the unit into the patient, the severed portion of the catheter is freely disposed in the patient's vein. Then, when the catheter is subsequently removed from the patient's vein, the freely disposed, severed portion of the catheter will remain in the patient's vein. In most instances, surgery is then required to remove the severed portion of the catheter from the patient, once it is recognized that the severed portion is still in the patient.
While stringent precautions can be taken to avoid such severing of the catheter and to assure that the entire catheter is removed from the patient when infusions therethrough are completed, it will be apparent that a catheter placement unit which prevents retraction of the catheter into the container of the unit will substantially obviate the problem.